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The contemporary student of dramatic criticism in America, unlike his counterparts in poetry and fiction, does not have a well-developed theoretical and analytical foundation from which to proceed. Apart from a "heterogenous collection of aphorisms and traditional tags," dramatic criticism tends toward a discrete focus, based on the shifting ground of personal opinion. Seeking a more integral view, Father Porter persuasively recommends a course suggested by the Cambridge Anthropologists as a means to a more fundamental approach to dramatic criticism. His approach relates drama to the cultural milieu in which it is produced, and creates a basis upon which to examine dramatic structure and meaning in a unified context. In the Introduction, the author examines what is involved in the cultural milieu as it relates to the theater. He includes the immediate American cultural situation as well as the dramatic tradition inherited by the playwright from his predecessors and the heritage of Western culture, "in effect, all those attitudes, ideals and traditions that determine or affect values, supply strategies and pattern human activities." A careful analysis of each of the major components of the cultural milieu utilizes illustrations from the plays subsequently studied in the book. On the basis of this thorough groundwork, Father Porter has selected nine American plays for analysis. Some-Eugene O'Neill's Mourning Becomes Electra, T. S. Eliot's The Cocktail Party, and Archibald MacLeish's J. B.-draw on traditional or conventional literary and dramatic sources which are molded into a new dramatic shape by their fusion with American attitudes. Others-Sidney Kingsley's Detective Story, Miller's Death of a Salesman and The Crucible, Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, Thornton Wilder's Our Town, and Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?-use popular sub-literary genres or contemporary institutions to forge new patterns of dramatic action. Just as the preceding nine chapters illustrate the utility of a general theoretical approach to dramatic criticism in the analysis of individual works, the concluding chapter vindicates the approach in terms of the light it enables Father Porter to shed on American drama per se. This work combines the virtues of an agreeable style and clarity of presentation with scholarly analysis. It will be valuable to scholars and students and the theatergoing public.
The Myth of Identity in Modern Drama is the first book-length study on existential authenticity and its relation to ontological embodiment treated via analyses of characters of modern drama. Furthermore, it offers new methods of exploring characters and characterization and new ways of thinking about identity. Through its investigations of the plays of Samuel Beckett, Eugene Ionesco and Jean-Paul Sartre, the book shows that the study of embodiment will allow for a new method of analyzing characters and how they form, or attempt to form, ever-changing identities.
New edition of Modern American Drama completes the survey and comes up to 2000.
This study focuses on Eugene O'Neill, Thornton Wilder, Arthur Miller, and Tennessee Williams, who, within the overall framework of formal realism, reshaped dramatic form to depict a past that interacts with the present in complex and often surprising ways. Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Award in Modern Drama.
The Decades of Modern American Drama series provides a comprehensive survey and study of the theatre produced in each decade from the 1930s to 2009 in eight volumes. Each volume equips readers with a detailed understanding of the context from which work emerged: an introduction considers life in the decade with a focus on domestic life and conditions, social changes, culture, media, technology, industry and political events; while a chapter on the theatre of the decade offers a wide-ranging and thorough survey of theatres, companies, dramatists, new movements and developments in response to the economic and political conditions of the day. The work of the four most prominent playwrights from the decade receives in-depth analysis and re-evaluation by a team of experts, together with commentary on their subsequent work and legacy. A final section brings together original documents such as interviews with the playwrights and with directors, drafts of play scenes, and other previously unpublished material. The major playwrights and their works to receive in-depth coverage in this volume include: * David Rabe: The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel; Sticks and Bones; and Streamers; * Sam Shepard: Curse of the Starving Class; Buried Child; and True West; * Ntozake Shange: For colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf; Spell #7; and Boogie-Woogie Landscapes * Richard Foreman: Sophia = (Wisdom) Part 3; The Cliffs; Pandering to the Masses: A Misrepresentation; and Rhoda in Potatoland (Her Fall-Starts).
Features a comprehensive guide to American dramatic literature, from its origins in the early days of the nation to the groundbreaking works of today's best writers.
Reader's Guide Literature in English provides expert guidance to, and critical analysis of, the vast number of books available within the subject of English literature, from Anglo-Saxon times to the current American, British and Commonwealth scene. It is designed to help students, teachers and librarians choose the most appropriate books for research and study.
Focusing on key texts, leading scholars explore how Hollywood has given an enduring life to the classics of Broadway theater.